


Sons

by softestpunk



Category: Assassin's Creed - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M, What-If, family bonding time with the Cormac-Kenways
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-12
Updated: 2019-09-12
Packaged: 2020-10-17 06:27:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,551
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20616485
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/softestpunk/pseuds/softestpunk
Summary: AU: What if Shay did exactly the thing Shay would do and just scooped up Arno on the way out after assassinating his dad in broad daylight? Instant son.





	Sons

**Author's Note:**

  * For [quills_at_dawn](https://archiveofourown.org/users/quills_at_dawn/gifts).

> for the trope bingo square: fork in the road
> 
> Plays fast and loose with timelines, I looked up how old Arno was, what more do you want from me??
> 
> Gifted to quills_at_dawn for encouragement and listening to me whine about burnout <3

Other men feared the door to Haytham Kenway’s study, but I never had. No, I’d always walked through it assured of a warm welcome—varying degrees of warm depending on how Haytham’s mood was and how recently I’d bathed, but always _welcome_.

This time, I wasn’t so sure. Had I made a mistake?

I couldn’t change the past now. I’d done it, and that was that.

Taking a breath to steady myself, I pushed the door open without bothering to knock, knowing at least that this was important enough to clear the room.

What I hadn’t expected—what I hadn’t even thought to check for—was an Assassin standing on the other side of Haytham’s desk, baring his teeth in the middle of an argument.

I also hadn’t expected to see Haytham calmly listening as the younger man—barely a man, really—snarled and ranted at him about some misstep Haytham had made in his mind.

“Ah,” Haytham said loudly when he caught sight of me at the door. “Shay. I hadn’t expected you back so soon.”

“No, I, umm. Got lucky.”

“Who is this?” the younger man turned to face me. Native, but somehow… familiar. I couldn’t place him, I didn’t recognise him, but maybe I’d known one of his parents. _That_ sort of familiarity. If I looked at him long enough it’d come to me, but he seemed in a bad mood and it was rude to stare.

“This is Shay Cormac,” Haytham said. “Who comes to me with extremely important news, I think.”

He said it as a dismissal, but the lad only crossed his arms over his chest and waited in sullen silence.

“Aye, well…” I hesitated with a stranger in the room, but this wasn’t the sort of thing I could hide for long. “About that.”

I pulled aside the edge of my coat to reveal a small boy clinging to the back of it, and extracted the Precursor box from inside.

“This is Arno,” I said, looking up at Haytham again. “And this is what you asked for.”

Haytham’s mouth fell open.

In all the years I’d known him, I’d never seen him shocked before. My guts twisted, fear that I’d disappointed him curling around my heart. I never wanted to disappoint Haytham, not for anything.

Except, maybe, for a little boy with no father and no one else in the world who’d needed a cuddle and someone to take care of him. And all that was my fault, and I couldn’t just… leave him.

“You were only gone six months,” Haytham said after a moment.

“He’s not… he’s Arno _Dorian_,” I said, meaningfully.

Haytham blinked, looked at Arno, looked at me, and then swallowed.

“I see,” he said.

“He’s eight years old, Haytham,” I added, desperate for him to understand why I’d done what I’d done. Haytham had been ten when he’d lost his father, I’d been fifteen. _Eight_ seemed brutal in comparison.

“I see,” he repeated. “Right, well. I think, umm…”

“What’s that?” the Native boy asked, nodding to the box.

“A Precursor artifact,” Haytham said.

“Like the one you were hunting for with my mother?” the boy asked, eyeing me suspiciously.

With his mother?

His mother… _Ziio_?

I looked at him again, the sense of familiarity washing over me anew.

I _did_ know one of his parents. One of his parents was the man I knew best in the entire world.

Haytham Kenway.

My mouth hung open like Haytham’s had a moment ago, my whole picture of the world reforming to include the fact that Haytham had a son. A teenage son, alive as long as we’d known each other—longer, even.

“I can explain,” Haytham said even as Arno took a cautious step toward Haytham’s son.

_Haytham__’s son_.

That’d take some getting used to.

He was handsome, though—good looks must’ve run all the way down the Kenway line, I thought. I’d seen a sketch of his sister once and been a little _too_ taken with how pretty she was for Haytham’s taste, but reminded him that I already had one Kenway and any more than that was likely more trouble than it was worth.

“I know how babies work,” I said, too shocked for anything else. “I, umm. Pleased to meet you,” I said, turning my attention to the boy. “Shay Cormac, at your service.”

I offered my hand, and after looking at it for a few moments, the boy accepted. “You may call me Connor.”

“Shay is a great friend of the Oneida,” Haytham added.

“I am not Oneida. You should know that.” Connor glanced at him, then back at me.

He was his father’s son in all the ways Haytham would have hated most.

Meanwhile, Arno had found a fox tail hanging off his belt and was reaching out to touch it with all the curiousity an eight-year-old could muster.

“No, but you are Iroquois,” Haytham said.

“Haudenosaunee,” I corrected automatically, then blushed at correcting Haytham right in front of his son, who he clearly didn’t get along all that well with.

“Yes,” Connor said, looking at me with wide, familiar eyes. So much younger than I’d ever seen Haytham, and yet I felt as though I was seeing a glimpse of the past in him all the same.

The Assassin’s robes needed some explaining, but then Haytham had Eagle Vision, and so Connor likely did, too. That’d make him attractive to the Assassins. Were they making a comeback?

“Arno.” I reached out to stop him tugging on Connor’s belt. “We ask before we touch.”

“He can touch,” Connor said, looking down at Arno with interest, and then crouching so they were of a height.

I put the Precursor box on the table, and met Haytham’s eyes.

“He’s all alone,” I said. “And I’m not getting any younger. Someone’ll have to replace me eventually. Got a head start, with an eight-year-old.”

I’d thought of thousands and thousands of things to say to him about why I’d taken Arno, but they all came down to _because he was alone_. Alone was awful, at any age.

I didn’t want him to suffer. Not more than I’d already ensured he would. I’d raise him as my own, and as a Templar, but teach him about his Assassin heritage, and why I’d made the choices I had, and hope like hell that he wouldn’t be the downfall of us all.

Hard to imagine him being anyone’s downfall right now, unless they died over how sweet he was.

“I’m keeping him,” I said. “Always wanted a son.”

A giggle drew my attention, and I glanced down to see Connor tickling Arno’s nose with a feather.

Well. At least _they_ were getting along.

“So did I,” Haytham said softly.

Connor glanced up at him, but didn’t say a word before turning his attention back to Arno.

“Well, I don’t mind sharing,” I said cheerfully. “Both of them, if you like. This one looks like he could keep me on my toes.” I nodded to Connor.

“Trained by Achilles himself,” Haytham said.

Connor shot him a shocked look, _his_ mouth hanging open now like both mine and Haytham’s had before.

“I have no secrets from Shay,” Haytham added. “As a matter of principle. As a matter of practicality, I haven’t had the opportunity to mention you to him yet. But I should formally introduce my son, Connor Kenway. This is Shay Cormac, the man I trust most in the world.”

“I know,” Connor said. “I have heard much of you, Shay.”

“All of it lies.” I smiled at him. “I’m nothing like he says I am, don’t worry.”

“He says you are obedient,” Connor grumbled, sitting down on the floor and pulling something out of one of his many pouches to show Arno. Arrow tips, carved from bone with vicious spikes on them. Not something I’d seen before. Probably something he’d invented himself. He seemed a smart boy, and if he’d inherited Haytham’s quickness along with his good looks…

A dangerous man, to be sure.

“I wouldn’t put it that way.” I grinned. “I just do what he tells me or he’ll sulk for weeks and I can’t stand it when he sulks.”

Haytham’s mouth fell open again. I liked Connor already.

“I’ll have a room made up for Arno,” Haytham said, glancing at him and Connor, who’d instantly gone back to taking Arno on a tour of all the sharp things he had about his person.

He’d be fine. The kid was an Assassin with Templar parents, now. Nothing the world threw at him would be too much. Not even a gentle prick from a bone dart as Connor demonstrated how sharp the point was.

“And you, of course.”

“Am I being kicked out of yours?” I asked.

Connor was bound to figure us out eventually, so there was no point in delaying it.

There was that shocked look again. This had gone _so_ much better than I’d imagined.

“No,” Haytham told his desk. “No, obviously, and certainly not for such a characteristic show of compassion. Things like this are why you were invited into it in the first place.”

Dragged into it, more like, but now wasn’t the time to split hairs over our shared history.

Things had worked out just fine.


End file.
